CIPA Before The Supreme Court

Jim Tyre pointed out the excellent collection of links on censorware.net to coverage of yesterday's oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court about the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA), as promised by this story last month. There's also a link to the place where transcripts of the oral arguments will show up about three weeks from now.

Comments

In case of slashdotting...

[FroMan]

Here I copied the text from the Children's Internet Protection Act link in the article. I'll post the others if they seem important.

Your Rights Online: CIPA Before The Supreme Court
CensorshipPosted by timothy on Thu 06 Mar 03:44PM
from the right-on-schedule dept.
Jim Tyre pointed out the excellent collection of links on censorware.net to coverage of yesterday's oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court about the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA), as promised by this story last month. There's also a link to the place where transcripts of the oral arguments will show up about three weeks from now.

( Read More... | 4 of 10 comments | Your Rights Online )
Ask Slashdot: HDTV-DVI Protocol Interpretation?
TelevisionPosted by Cliff on Thu 06 Mar 03:20PM
from the figuring-out-what-it-all-REALLY-means dept.
ignipotentis asks: "I have recently been looking into getting a Sony 50" Grand Wega. However, the one thing that deters me is the lack of obvious PC support. I would like to use the TV as a monitor for a living room PC as well as a TV. So I set off to do some investigation. I came across the ATI Component Adapters and then came across the reviews stating their overscan problems. Next I decided to check out the details on DVI (DVI & HDCP) and I've become rather confused. From what I gather, HDTV-DVI is nothing but DVI-D + HDCP. Now, being DVI-D, it can accept a signal from any DVI-I video card as long as a DVI-D male to male cable is used. Where I become confused is in the HDCP protocol. The way I read it, the Host (my computer) in this case, initiates the authenticity check whenever it wants. If it doesn't receive a valid reply, it can stop the stream. However, nothing is stated (that I can see) as to what would happen if no check was ever performed. If the Client (the TV) just continues to display what it receives, then all is good. If it does not, then I guess I'm back to the drawing board looking for other TVs. My question to Slashdot regards that of the protocol. I've emailed info@digital-cp.com only to getan automated response as a reply and I'm hoping that someone a bit more technically savvy than myself can interpret the HDCP protocol better than I have been able to."

( Read More... | 1 of 6 comments | Ask Slashdot )
Oregon Bill Would Require Open Source Consideration
United StatesPosted by timothy on Thu 06 Mar 02:51PM
from the commonwealth dept.
VeniDormi writes "I just found out that House Bill 2892 was introduced in the Oregon House of Representatives by Representative Phil Barnhart. The summary: 'Requires state government to consider using open source software when acquiring new software. Sets other requirements for acquiring software.' Rep. Barnhart has a few comments on the bill." A NewsForge story has more information, including some words from Rep. Barnhart.

( Read More... | 48 of 116 comments )
Ask Slashdot: Funny and Irrelevant Program Names?
It's funny. Laugh.Posted by Cliff on Thu 06 Mar 02:15PM
from the just-for-the-fun-of-it dept.
dentar asks: "I got into a conversation with a peer today about funny names we've given programs in the past. I have a small program I wrote for a client called omnihurl whose purpose is to get a summary listing of their last 20 omniback backups and display them. I called it that because I couldn't think of a good name when I wrote it.. It never got renamed. That program is still used every day and is about seven years old. The guy I was talking with had written a backup script named shazbot. A few years later a friend and I wrote a program that was going to be a dynamic DNS type of client and server. I couldn't think of a name for those either, so they wound up being whale and plankton. We still laugh about it. So, how's about y'all? What's the funniest thing you ever named a program? The more irrelevant to its purpose, the better."

( Read More... | 35 of 59 comments | Ask Slashdot )
Science: The Big Rip
SciencePosted by michael on Thu 06 Mar 02:03PM
from the sliced-thin dept.
WolfWithoutAClause writes "It's been known for decades that the universe is expanding. The current evidence points to this rate of expansion increasing, and if so, there's no obvious reason why the expansion rate couldn't continue to increase ever faster. A physicist, Simon Caldwell, has taken this to inevitable conclusion and suggested the expansion will eventually reach a point where the expansion rate is so high that any surviving people will ripped apart, followed a millisecond later by the destruction of all the atoms in the universe. Ouch. New Scientist says we may only have 22 billion years left. Almost enough time for a quick game of Everquest then."

( Read More... | 9 of 14 comments | Science )
China's 64bit Homegrown CPU
HardwarePosted by michael on Thu 06 Mar 02:01PM
from the enter-the-dragon dept.
An anonymous reader writes: "EE Times is reporting on China's BLX IC Design Corp nearing the completion of their first 64-bit CPU. Based on the MIPS instruction set the 500-MHz Godson-2 microprocessor is aimed toward distributed grid computing. To avoid MIPS patent issues, several instructions (unaligned loads and storeds in the 32 bit version) have not been implemented but with the support of over 60 software providers such as Red Flag Linux and the ability to tweak compilers to not use these instructions this should not be a problem. The Godson-1 processor (also patent free) was announced last year and was aimed at the embedded market." The Godson processor line has generally been called Dragon by the Western press.

( Read More... | 76 of 177 comments )
Ask Slashdot: Best DVD -Player- for Burned DVD Media?
HardwarePosted by Cliff on Thu 06 Mar 01:30PM
from the for-playing-your-own-movies dept.
multiOSfreak asks: "I recently picked up a DVD-R/RW drive on the cheap, and I was wondering which component DVD players have the widest latitude of compatibility with 'burned' DVD media. I have a Toshiba SD-1600, and it's very picky about the media (so far, it will only play Princo and Verbatim DataLife +). I've looked at a ton of sites on DVD players, but none of them gave comments from actual users on how well they worked, firmware upgrades, etc. Epinions is okay, but the level of knowledge of most reviewers is nowhere near that of the Slashdot community." What DVD Players are the least picky about the media they use?

( Read More... | 10 of 12 comments | Ask Slashdot )
UT Austin Hit By Massive Security Breach
PrivacyPosted by timothy on Thu 06 Mar 01:11PM
from the wonder-if-they-got-mine dept.
mrpuffypants writes "Reported in the Austin-American Statesman: The University of Texas' security was compromised over the weekend, leaking out nearly 60,000 records on students, staff, and faculty. Official word from the school can be found here. Most troubling of all is that, like most schools, UT still uses SSNs for student ID numbers, and that was part of the information taken from them in the attack."

( Read More... | 153 of 383 comments )
Interviews: Ask About Proprietary vs. Open Source Code Quality
ProgrammingPosted by Roblimo on Thu 06 Mar 12:20PM
from the bugstomping dept.
Scott Trappe is CEO of Reasoning, a company that has gained a certain amount of noteriety (and a Slashdot mention) by running its Ilumna automated inspection service on several versions of TCP/IP -- and concluding that the Linux version has fewer bugs than most proprietary ones. Why is this? Let's ask Scott, and also ask him any other question you can think of about software quality and how to achieve it since, after all, that's his business. We'll send him 10 of the highest-moderated questions and post his answers when we get them back.

( Read More... | 68 of 134 comments | Interviews )
Slashdot Subscribers Now See The Future
Slashdot.orgPosted by CmdrTaco on Thu 06 Mar 11:30AM
from the well-isn't-that-special dept.
We're pleased to announce the newest reason for you to subscribe to Slashdot. Besides the ability to suppress banner ads, limit journal postings to friends, and a few plums, Subscribers now see stories posted on Slashdot from The Mysterious Future! These stories are recognizable by the red title bar, and the lack of a time stamp. Subscribers will be able to beat the rush and read the links before everyone else. You can hit the link below and I'll explain exactly what this means. If this appeals to you, you could read the subscriber FAQ or just go subscribe.

( Read More... | 3065 bytes in body | 393 of 742 comments )
Book Reviews: The Space Elevator
SpacePosted by timothy on Thu 06 Mar 10:45AM
from the long-cable-long-review dept.
James Yonan writes "For years, the space elevator concept has been a staple of science fiction fare, popularized by Arthur C. Clark in The Fountains of Paradise, a convenient and plausibly feasible technology for building a vertical railroad of sorts, tens of thousands of kilometers tall, linking earth with geosynchronous orbit. Unsatisfied with the unquestioning consignment of the space elevator concept to science fiction status, authors Bradley C. Edwards and Eric A. Westling set out to understand why it could or couldn't be done. The result is a compelling new book, backed up by voluminous research, which concludes that space elevators are near-term-feasible. Edwards and Westling have not only convinced roomfuls of skeptics of the basic concept, but have also won serious funding from NASA for continuing their work. This book, The Space Elevator, is one of the fruits of their ongoing research." This is a long review (continued below), but the subject demands it.

( Read More... | 13837 bytes in body | 249 of 527 comments | Book Reviews )
Science: ESA Opens Deep Space Antenna in Australia
SpacePosted by michael on Thu 06 Mar 09:56AM
from the is-anybody-out-there dept.
Gavinsblog writes "New Scientist is reporting that the European Space Agency has opened the first of its new deep space antennae. It is 35 metres across and can operate at up to 32 Ghz - able to provide a link to spacecraft up to 900 million kilometres away."

( Read More... | 4 of 11 comments | Science )
Your Rights Online: ICANN vs. ccTLDs in Geneva
The InternetPosted by michael on Thu 06 Mar 09:55AM
from the wardrums dept.
Gallowglass writes "The Register is reporting on an interesting meeting in Geneva. To quote from the article, 'Why the huge fuss? Because the meeting threatened to turn into a caucus where rising resentment against ICANN and its attempt to stamp ultimate authority over the Internet could have escalated into international agreement and action.' Didn't quite, but the natives are restless. The article has links to all presentations given at the two day meeting, and also an audio of the event at the bottom of the article. It's also a good summary of the controversy and of its history."

( Read More... | 32 of 68 comments | Your Rights Online )
Peace Corps to Wire Senegal
NewsPosted by michael on Thu 06 Mar 09:10AM
from the goodwill-to-men dept.
An anonymous submitter wrote: "Peace Corps Online is reporting on the White House's Digital Freedom Initiative that will place volunteers from the Peace Corps, Hewlett-Packard and Cisco in a pilot program in Senegal where they will leverage nearly 200 cybercafes and 10,000 telecenters to provide opportunities for small businesses and entrepreneurs. The idea isn't new - David Rothman proposed an Electronic Peace Corps in 1984, the Geek Corps has been doing this kind of work in Ghana for years, and the Peace Corps already has about 1,500 volunteers working in information technology."

( Read More... | 60 of 127 comments )
ATi Radeon 9800 Pro
GraphicsPosted by michael on Thu 06 Mar 08:21AM
from the purty-pictures dept.
ATi is bringing out their new card, the Radeon 9800 Pro, and all of the hardware review sites which depend on ATi's generosity for pre-release hardware have released their necessarily favorable reviews. Here's a few: Hothardware.com, Hexus.net, HardOCP.com, Anandtech, Tom's Hardware, Extremetech, PCWorld.

( Read More... | 117 of 265 comments )
Apple: Mac OS X 10.2.x DIsables Modifier Keys?
BugPosted by pudge on Thu 06 Mar 07:23AM
from the works-for-me dept.
drunkToaster writes " Adobe's support pages note that Mac OS X 10.2.x fails to re-enable modifier keys after an authentication session. The keys are disabled during the user/password dance as a security measure. Adobe explains a workaround for the problem which drastically effects many of its applications (Photoshop, Illustrator, etc)." This makes no sense to me; I authenticate to various servers etc. all day long, and never have problems with modifier keys. The Adobe explanation seems wholly inadequate.

( Read More... | 11 of 27 comments | Apple )
Are Video Blogs Ready For Prime Time?
The MediaPosted by timothy on Thu 06 Mar 07:03AM
from the be-your-own-nina-pineda dept.
Markmarkmark writes "Is video blogging ready for prime-time? Can Internet talking 'blog-heads' beat the talking heads on Fox? Is the next Andy Rooney-type commentator going to be a /.er? With new technology and a little creativity, this MSNBC article today thinks so. 'The big problems have been setting up lights and a camera in my study properly, so that I don't look dead, or hung over.'" The article is about the software / hardware it takes to set up a microstudio; the author does not really explore much about the video-blogging implications -- but you can.

( Read More... | 77 of 180 comments )
Pancake Physics to Cut Batter Splatter
It's funny. Laugh.Posted by chrisd on Thu 06 Mar 03:58AM
from the all-hail-science dept.
Anonymous Coward writes "The headline just about says it all on this one. A physics grad student in the UK has come up with the mathematical formula for how to flip a pancake and have it land correctly back in the pan. The BBC has the details."

( Read More... | 93 of 274 comments )
Your Rights Online: Australian Federal Police Raid Major ISPs
PrivacyPosted by timothy on Thu 06 Mar 01:29AM
from the overzealous-or-regular-zealous dept.
pflodo writes "The Australian (newspaper) has an article about Telstra the major Australian ISP and other 'declined to name' ISPs that have been raided by Australian Federal Police to 'seek the identity of particular subscribers' in relation to their activity and files stored on the ISP's servers. I imagine they will eventually raid some domestic homes and make a scapegoat of some unfortunate teenagers."

( Read More... | 142 of 302 comments | Your Rights Online )
Your Rights Online: Ashcroft v. Registrars on Domain Property Status
The InternetPosted by timothy on Wed 05 Mar 11:38PM
from the hey-that's-not-a-press dept.
pbuxton writes "Here's a CNN story about the confiscation of domain names by law enforcement. An interesting dilemma noted in the story is that a domain name is either a mere service, which would let Verisign, et al., off the legal hook for mismanagement, or it is property which can be siezed by police and judges." This story mentions (and adds some perspective) to the recent seizure of ISOnews.com.

( Read More... | 27 of 47 comments | Your Rights Online )

Re:How about parents raise their children...

[Carmody]

When was the last time Congress ever voted to give anybody more power other than to themselves?

Rural electrification?
Voting rights act?
Motor voter bill?

Re:How about parents raise their children...

[Carmody]

The question was: When has Congress passed legislation to give power to someone other than themselves.

Rural electrification did that. Literally. The question was not "When has Congress passed legislation to give power only to someone other than themselves."